


count the headlights on the highway

by orphan_account



Category: Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys (Album), My Chemical Romance
Genre: jetpoison if you squint, mostly dysfunctional family fab four, party poison is just a stressed teen mom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-30 23:57:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19414159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: poison laughed. it came out choked, like he was about to cry. "i don't know how to take care of a fuckin' kid," he admitted in a whisper. "jet, she's five. she's a fuckin' toddler. how the hell do you keep a five year old safe out here?""we do our best," jet told him.





	count the headlights on the highway

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this... a while ago. i once wanted to write more of it, but it's been a while and i definitely haven't, so have this. wip!

with an aggravated sigh, poison threw a rock out at the road. it had been a long day- successful, but long- and all he wanted to do was curl up in the backseat of the trans am and sleep. instead, he was sat on the side of the road with a cigarette while the others hung out inside dr. death's place, talking and laughing and enjoying each other's company. he should've been in there too, should've mustered up the energy to socialize for just a few minutes longer. but he couldn't.

he'd almost died that day. a drac had a blaster pointed directly at poison's heart that afternoon, and had kobra been a split second late with his glove, he would've died. it was something he figured he would've gotten used to by now, frequent near death experiences. but he hadn't. it shook poison to his core every time, made his head spin and his heart thud violently out of his chest to the point he felt light headed and sick. he'd almost _died_. 

a steady crunch in the gravel behind him caught poison's attention, and immediately his head whipped around, cigarette nearly falling out of his hand. "oh. hey."

"you alright?" dr. death pressed, rolling his wheelchair over beside poison, who lifted his cigarette to his lips and took a shaky drag. 

"m'fine," poison replied, blowing a stream of smoke. "long day."

"mmh, heard you boys kept busy this afternoon."

"you should'a seen the other guy."

dr. d laughed, leaning forward a little to really look at poison. "what do you think of the little girl?"

poison shrugged. "she's sweet. who is she?"

"the daughter of a friend," dr. d answered, gesturing a hand vaguely. "promised cola i'd look after her. she's a good kid."

"she's fuckin' young," poison noted. 

"girly says she just turned five last month."

"jesus christ," poison whispered.

dr. d shrugged. "she'll be fine. we'll keep her safe." 

"... we?"

at that, dr. d fought off a weary smile. "i have a pretty big favor to ask of you."

"oh, for fuck's sake."

"hear me out, party poison." dr. death's voice was suddenly very serious, and with a sigh, poison turned to stamp out his cigarette in the dirt, before turning his full attention to the man beside him. "show pony and i have been doing our best to look after her, but..." he sighed, gaze flicking up to look out at the road. "things have gotten rough, poison. health problems, old traces of radiation... the war's coming back to bite me in the ass, so to speak. pony's looking after me and the girl at once, and i can't..." he shook his head. "not right now."

"so you want us to take her in."

"not permanently," dr. d assured him. it wasn't very reassuring. "a few weeks, tops. give me some time to rest. i'm old, poison, old and deteriorating."

poison frowned. "don't fuckin' say that."

"you know it's true." poison didn't answer. "a few weeks. take care of her for me, she needs stability. safety."

 _our crew is just as safe as you are_ , poison wanted to shout. he didn't. "christ, dr. d, we're far from stable. jet and i are barely adults, kobra and ghoul are still practically kids. you think we can handle a fucking five year old?"

"you and kobra were kids together," dr. d supplied. "you've got more experience with little kids than pony and i do already."

"yeah, but _i_ was a fuckin' kid when kobra was little, too!" poison groaned, flopping back onto the dirt and staring up at the sky. the sun was already dipping down below the horizon, and they'd have to be scrambling for shelter soon. with a fucking five year old girl, no less. "i can't take care of a fuckin' kid. i'm no parent."

"then be her brother," dr. d told him, before turning and rolling his wheelchair back to the warehouse. "c'mon back in, poison, you and your boys can spend the night here. it's getting late."

"tell them to come out here," poison grumbled, before pushing himself into a crouch and back onto his feet. "girly, too, i guess. we're gonna run."

dr. d just shrugged, pushing the door open with a, "suit yourself," before disappearing inside.

 _we are so fucked_ , poison thought.

~

as soon as she was lifted into the backseat of the trans am, the girl crawled from her spot in the middle to sit on ghoul's lap, one tiny hand playing with a lock of his hair. "can i braid it?"

"you know how to braid, girly?"

"mhmm," the girl hummed enthusiastically. "my mommy has long hair, too. she taught me how."

in the driver's seat, poison winced, revving the engine once to get everyone's attention. "ready?"

"yeah."

"we're good."

jet nodded once, grasping the seatbelt in one hand, and poison's forearm in the other. "you good?"

a sigh. "yeah." 

a click of a seatbelt later, poison hit the gas, and they were off. it was usually poison who drove- he hadn't learned in the city, didn't need to, but show pony had managed to find scraps of driver's ed software and taught him the basics. he'd passed along some of that information to jet, but for the most part, poison drove. it gave him a chance to breathe and focus on anything but the wars in his head. he had enough battles to fight without bringing his own shit into the mix. 

"girl's gonna be staying with us for a bit," poison spoke into the comfortable silence, rendering the rest of the car- except the girl, who was far too busy pulling strands of fun ghoul's greasy hair into a sloppy braid- just as tense as he felt. "dr. d's getting sick, can't look after her. so i told him we'd take her."

this time around, the silence weighed on poison's shoulders like lead. until jet spoke. "sounds good to me," he reassured poison. he glanced at jet out of the corner of his eye, and saw the soft, slightly forced smile on his face. poison didn't honestly know where he'd be without jet. "what do you think, girly? wanna run with the boys for a while?"

"yeah!" the girl squeaked, turning from her work to beam at jet and poison. "are we gonna fight draculoids? i've seen those before. dr. d and pony and cola saved me from them once. it was really cool."

poison bit back a distressed groan, instead tightening his grip on the steering wheel and focusing on the road ahead. kobra ended up saving him, ruffling the girls choppy fro and smiling kindly at her. "we'll keep you safe from 'em, don't you worry."

poison forced himself to tune out of the conversation from there, staring down route guano and numbing all thoughts save for the direction they were headed. he jumped a little when jet switched on the stereo, but glanced his way and smiled weakly in thanks. 

" _welcome to the jungle, we got fun and games._

 _we got everything you want, honey, we know the names._ "

"what's a jungle?" the girl asked, turning in ghoul's lap to tilt her head at kobra.

kobra shrugged. "somethin' from way before you were born, baby. lots of trees and rain and crazy animals."

the girl sighed, leaning back against ghoul's chest. "i wanna go to the jungle."

halfway through the song jet turned the volume down a little and looked over at poison, watching his stoic expression curiously. "you sure you're alright?"

poison sighed. "just shaken up, s'all. didn't expect to be responsible for a five year old anytime soon."

"i'm almost six," the girl piped up, then settled back against ghoul and closed her eyes. 

"... an almost six year old, then."

as they drove past a beat up sign reading "zone 4" in bold capital letters, poison swung a left off the road, gritting his teeth as the car jumped and pushed through the dirt the tires had kicked up. "there's an old convenience store back here," poison told jet, then leaned forward a little to peer through the dust. there was a pretty tall outcropping of rock that sheltered it from the view on the road, but as they rolled through the dirt it popped up, a weathered circle k fronted by broken gas pumps that probably hadn't been used in a decade, tops. "kobes, you got the blankets?"

"yeah. don't think we'll need 'em, there's no way this thing isn't fuckin' baked inside."

poison sighed, nodding. "get 'em anyway, better than laying on tile." he parked the trans am sideways where parking spaces might've been, then shut off the ignition and leaned back. "alright. s'prolly locked up. jet?"

"i'm on it," jet replied quickly and hopped out of the car, making his way to the front doors of the store. 

"ghoul?"

when poison turned his head to look into the backseat, ghoul met his eyes with wide, confused ones. "i think she's asleep."

"then carry her."

"but i don't wanna wake her up!"

a blaster went off, and poison's head snapped toward the sound- jet had given up and shot the lock off the doors, then kicked it in and watched it swing. "we're in!"

"i'll carry her," poison sighed, then kicked the car door open and stood up on the concrete. he paused a moment to stretch his arms outward, eyes closing and breaths surging into his lungs near desperately. 

it was going to be one hell of a long night.

~

it always ended up this way. the four- now five, counting the girl- would lay out blankets and curl up on the floor and pass out from sheer exhaustion, all except for poison. the eldest boy almost always lay awake instead, staring at the ceiling, sitting away from the others so as not to wake them up.

tonight he'd chosen the curb outside the convenient store, sitting cross-legged with a cigarette and a grimace. memories from his childhood he'd long repressed since leaving the city played over and over in his head as he struggled to think of exactly how he could possibly take care of a little girl. he saw a tiny kobra with wispy pigtails sitting on the floor and crying, one he couldn't console until the bad man let little poison go. he saw a slightly bigger kobra reading out of a children's book aloud to him- it was their favorite story, but poison couldn't remember how it went. he saw a pre-teen kobra in the bathroom with clippers looking terrified as poison caught him red handed. "i love you no matter what," he'd promised his brother. it hadn't changed.

caught up in his reverie, poison didn't hear the door swing open and gently close behind him, only barely registered someone's boots hitting the concrete in front of him as they sat down- he looked up, and there was jet. "hey."

"hey." a pause. "can't sleep?"

poison smiled thinly. "you know me."

wordlessly, jet held out a hand. poison passed him the cigarette, and watched as jet lifted it to his lips to take a drag. his gaze lingered a little too long there before flicking up to meet jet's eyes. "you're stressed," jet observed as he let out a breath of smoke.

"no shit."

"well, talk to me about it," jet pressed, stretching his legs out in front of them. his eyes stayed trained on poison, to the point that poison had to drop his head and look away to keep from breaking under his stare. "you're doing that thing where you pretend you're fine again, but you're a bad fuckin' liar, man."

poison laughed. it came out choked, like he was about to cry. "i don't know how to take care of a fuckin' kid," he admitted in a whisper. "jet, she's five. she's a fuckin' toddler. how the hell do you keep a five year old safe out here?"

"we do our best," jet told him. poison glanced up briefly to look at jet, who's face was deadly serious. " _we_ , poison. don't take this all on yourself, especially if you know you can't handle it."

"ghoul and kobra, they're practically kids themselves," poison hissed. he buried his head in his hands, raking his fingers through his fiery hair roughly. "hell, _we're_ practically kids."

"we grew up fast. and she might too, but that's not your fault. that's the zones." out of the corner of his eye, poison watched jet stamp out the cigarette on the curb and drop it, then shift his body closer to poison's and sling an arm over his shoulders. poison leaned into the side embrace gratefully. "she's gonna be fine. we're gonna be fine."

poison sighed, nestling his head in the crook of jet's neck and closing his eyes. "please don't make promises you can't keep."

silence. poison felt the press of lips to his temple and melted, felt the ghost of jet's breath on the side of his face and relaxed. "c'mon, let's get some sleep."

"you're comfy."

jet chuckled, grasping poison's arms and helping him to stand, then walked back into the store with him, still holding on, as if poison would float away if he let go. truthfully, poison felt he might. before poison could settle down on his blanket, jet tightened his grip on poison's arms. "no, c'mere."

"what?"

jet steered poison over to his own blanket, and with a tired sigh poison crouched down and rested on his knees, watching jet recline into the space and open up his arms. a soft smile spread poison's lips wide, and he shuffled over to lay down next to him, slinging an arm over jet's waist to turn him enough to rest his forehead on jet's shoulder.

"thank you," poison whispered into jet's shirt. 

a gentle hand started to stroke poison's hair, fingertips grazing his scalp and making him shudder drowsily. "sleep," jet insisted. and he did. 

~

before poison could restrain her, the girl darted ahead of the group and into the beat up hotel that housed the zone-famous tommy chow mein's supply store. he picked up the pace of his strides to catch up, but girly made it into the building before he did, and when he swung the front door open he found her at the front desk, up on her toes to fold her arms over the table.

"hi, tommy!"

the owner in question sighed, dropping a radio he'd been tinkering at to lean down and size the girl up with an incredibly fake smile. "you look like hell, kid." the door fell shut behind poison, and tommy's head snapped up. "i can see why."

poison just rolled his eyes as he strode over to meet the girl. behind him he could hear the others piling inside, rushing around to grab what they needed. "i know you've seen worse." 

"sure, but worse is usually still you." 

on the other side of the room, ghoul lifted a battery pack in dismay and shouted, "forty carbons my ass! you've sold us more power for less before!"

"s'called supply and demand,” tommy replied, leaning back in his swivel chair and wincing at the rusty screech. 

the girl leaned her chin on the desk, blinking curiously at tommy. "what's supply and demand?" at that, tommy outright groaned.

with a laugh, poison shuffled off to browse around the food section of the store- power pup, power pup, more power pup... and an eighty carbon can of beans. poison grabbed the power pup. 

across the way, poison spotted the girl sizing up a row of books- namely a tattered old mousekat coloring book. his eyes dropped to the cans of power pup in his hands, and he sighed. "hey, girly-"

when he looked up again, he saw jet crouched in front of the girl with a smile on his face, handing her a dirty pack of crayons. the girl's face lit up, and she practically tackled jet with a hug, little arms flying around his neck as she frantically whispered, "thank you, thank you!" to him. 

jet caught poison's gaze a moment later, and poison grinned. 


End file.
